Israel soldiers on the border with the Gaza Strip shot dead a Palestinian Friday, in the first fatality since a ceasefire Wednesday which ended eight days of cross-border fighting, dpa reported. Family members of the dead man told dpa he was killed while rushing the border fence east of the southern city of Khan Younis, clutching a Hamas flag, during a demonstration to protest the wounding, earlier in the day, of five Palestinians who were returning to their farms adjacent to the boundary. Friday's incident was the first real test of the truce agreed on Wednesday night which ended Israel's Operation Pillar of Defence, launched on November 14, after weeks of Palestinian rocket attacks on Israeli cities.
